Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Our message to everybody who is interested in seeing this project move forward and to all northerners is that this government's support for the project is unwavering. We believe that the people on the ground in the communities are eagerly anticipating the project.

We want to see this happen, we want the economic benefits that can come from a development like this, but we want to make sure it's done in the appropriate manner. We're very confident that the environmental review process, the cooperation plan that's been laid out, is a comprehensive review process that will make sure that there isn't the duplication that we might have seen in past projects, and there's quite a potential with all the overlapping mandates and a number of different authorities involved that that would happen without this cooperation plan. So we think we're in for a very comprehensive and thorough environmental review, and we're in full support of that.

The recent announcements from Imperial, their decision to defer some of the on-the-ground work and refocus efforts on the regulatory process and on access and benefit agreements that they feel they haven't made the necessary progress on is obviously we're happy to see the additional horsepower and effort put into these areas, into the regulatory review process and into access and benefits. It is a concern to us that some of the work was deferred. What we need to do is to move as quickly as possible to resolve some of these outstanding issues so that come the late summer and early fall when the public hearing process is slated to begin, the project proponents have the necessary level of comfort and certainty that they need to continue to participate. What we don't want to see is the project's proponent pull away from the project at that stage, because that would be a significant delay. We think the delay here, the work that has been deferred this summer, is something that can be recovered in terms of critical timing, and still allow us to deliver gas before the end of 2010.

The work that needs to be done on access and benefits agreements is something that we've taken a real interest in. The Minister of Finance, the Premier and I have been in Ottawa meeting with our counterparts to try to deal with the outstanding socioeconomic issues and needs and pressures up and down the valley that rightfully should be on the shoulders of northern governments and not the project proponents. We're owning up to those responsibilities and acknowledging that there's a lot of work to be done, but also making the very clear point that it's the federal government that needs to fund the programs and services that are required, and the federal government, to their credit, now have acknowledged that. They've acknowledged a responsibility for funding and

we're now negotiating with the federal government and with aboriginal governments a deal that would see us able to address some of these socioeconomic impacts so that we can pave the way for a commercial deal on access and benefits, and that work is ongoing. I know the Premier's office is in contact with Ottawa this week as well, and the Minister of Finance, his office as well continues that work. So hopefully in the coming couple of weeks we will have additional meetings in Ottawa and look to get a resolution on this issue. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.